‘Fela’s shoes are too big for me’ – Gideon Okeke

Star of Tinsel, Gideon Okeke, says the Afrobeat King’s shoes are too big for him to step into.

He made this remark, in a chat with newsmen shortly after his brilliant performance at the MUSON festival.

Gideon insisted that he was not trying to be Fela, even though it took him time to understudy the Afrobeat king. “I am not trying to be Fela. I only interpreted in songs and dance some of the things he stood for while he lived, his personality and lifestyle,”he said.

The creative piece, “Fela.. Arrest the music”produced by Declassical Arts and Entertainment Company in collaboration with MUSON Center was a musical on the life and times of the legend Fela Anikulapo Kuti.

The piece, written by Paul Ugbede, (winner of the Beeta Foundation Playwrights competition), expressed in songs and dance the daily struggles of an African man; how he is being subjected to the forces of suppression and humiliation from the western world, his own government, the society, et al.

The versatile actor has always proved he’s a different specie when it comes to acting.